The Gathas.
Seventeen hymns in a language older than the rest of the Avesta, generally accepted as the prophet's own words. They are personal, argumentative and extremely obscure — he asks Ahura Mazda direct questions, complains that he has no cattle and few men, and demands to know who set the stars in their courses. No two translations agree.
The Gathas are seventeen hymns preserved within the Yasna, in Old Avestan — a language demonstrably older than the rest of the Avesta and closely related to the Sanskrit of the Rigveda, which is the principal evidence for an early date for Zarathustra. They are grouped into five sets by metre. Their character is personal and argumentative rather than narrative or legislative: Zarathustra addresses Ahura Mazda directly and asks questions, including a famous sequence in Yasna 44 that repeatedly begins with this I ask you, tell me truly — who fixed the course of the sun and stars, who holds the earth below and the sky from falling, who made light and darkness. He complains that he has few cattle and few men, asks for protection, and attacks named opponents. They are also extremely difficult: the Old Avestan is imperfectly understood, the syntax is compressed, and translations diverge so widely that reformist and traditionalist Zoroastrians can each find support in them for opposed positions, which is a live feature of contemporary community argument.
This I ask you, tell me truly, Lord: who fixed the course of the sun and the stars? Who is it through whom the moon waxes and wanes? Who holds the earth below and the sky from falling?
Gathas, Yasna 44.3–4 (rendered)The prophet asking direct questions, in the oldest layer of the text.
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